Using subpoena
in debt collection.

Forcing the debtor to disclose assets under oath

Every collection tool on this site depends on knowing what the debtor has and where it is. The debtor knows. The debtor has spent the last year making sure you do not. A subpoena ends that. It compels the debtor, and the people who hold the debtor's records, to appear, produce documents, and answer questions under oath, with the court's contempt power standing behind every question.

What a subpoena does in debt collection

After a judgment is entered, Florida's rules of civil procedure give the creditor the same discovery tools that were available during the lawsuit, now aimed at finding assets. The creditor can obtain a court order requiring the debtor to complete a fact information sheet, a sworn form listing the debtor's employer, income, bank accounts, real estate, vehicles, and other property, within forty-five days. The creditor can take the debtor's deposition in aid of execution, questioning the debtor under oath before a court reporter about every asset, transfer, and source of income. And the creditor can issue subpoenas: to the debtor, requiring appearance and production of documents such as tax returns, bank statements, titles, and business records, and to third parties, banks, employers, accountants, business partners, and relatives, requiring the same.

The subpoena for deposition duces tecum, which requires both testimony and documents, is the workhorse. It is served on the debtor with a list of the records to bring. The debtor must appear, produce, and answer. The transcript becomes part of the record, and the information in it directs the garnishments, levies, and proceedings supplementary that follow.

Why this matters to your judgment

A subpoena changes the debtor's incentives. Silence has been free; now it has a cost. A debtor who ignores a subpoena or a court order to complete the fact information sheet can be held in contempt of court, and a debtor who continues to ignore the court's orders can be subject to a writ of bodily attachment, which is an order for the debtor's arrest until the debtor complies. Debtors who have been unreachable for a year tend to become reachable when a deputy is involved.

The examination also produces what the debtor would rather not say. Under oath, with documents in front of them, debtors disclose bank accounts they forgot to mention, property titled to relatives, income from a business that "closed," and transfers made the week after your demand letter. Each disclosure is a lead, and each lie is perjury. Many judgment collections resolve at this stage, not because the debtor was caught with a hidden fortune, but because the debtor understands that the process will continue, in detail, until the judgment is paid.

Just suppose

The following is an illustrative example, written to show how the process works. It is not a real client, a real matter, or a promise of any result.

Imagine you own a commercial-printing company in St. Petersburg. A marketing agency ran up $34,000 in print jobs for its clients, collected from those clients, and never paid you. You obtained a judgment against the agency and its owner, who signed a guaranty. Since then: nothing. Demand letters unanswered. Calls unreturned. The agency's website still lists the owner as CEO and its address as a coworking space downtown. A bank garnishment, based on an old check, found the account closed.

Your counsel obtains an order requiring the owner to complete a fact information sheet. The deadline passes. Counsel moves for contempt; the court orders the owner to appear and show cause. He does not. The court issues a writ of bodily attachment. A week later the owner's new lawyer calls, and the owner appears for a deposition in aid of execution with the documents counsel subpoenaed: two years of personal and business bank statements, tax returns, and the agency's client contracts. Under questioning, the statements show that the agency's clients have been paying a new LLC in the owner's girlfriend's name, that the owner draws a salary from that LLC, and that he bought a boat eight months ago, titled to himself.

The deposition transcript becomes the roadmap. A continuing writ of garnishment goes to the new LLC for the owner's salary. A writ of execution goes to the sheriff for the boat. A motion for proceedings supplementary impleads the girlfriend's LLC as the recipient of the agency's diverted receivables. Before the boat is sold, the owner pays the judgment.

How post-judgment discovery works in Florida

It usually begins with a motion for an order requiring the fact information sheet, which the court grants as a matter of course. If the debtor complies, the sheet identifies the first targets. If the debtor does not, or the sheet is obviously incomplete, a subpoena for deposition duces tecum is served, requiring the debtor to appear with records. Third-party subpoenas go to banks and others as leads develop. Noncompliance is met with a motion for contempt, an order to show cause, and, where the debtor still refuses, a writ of bodily attachment. Each step is documented, because the contempt power depends on a clear record of what the debtor was ordered to do and did not do.

Debtors are served personally with subpoenas, and a debtor determined to evade service can slow the process; each attempt has a cost, and a missed appearance means rescheduling. The process is nonetheless relentless, and it is the debtor, not the creditor, who runs out of options.

Common questions

Can I subpoena the debtor's bank directly?

Yes. Third-party subpoenas to banks, employers, and others are a standard part of post-judgment discovery, subject to notice to the debtor and the bank's own procedures.

What if the debtor lies at the deposition?

Testimony is under oath, and false testimony is perjury. More practically, the documents subpoenaed alongside the testimony usually contradict the lie, and the contradiction is used in proceedings supplementary and fraudulent transfer claims.

Can the debtor really be arrested?

A debtor cannot be jailed for owing money. A debtor can be taken into custody for defying a court order, which is what a writ of bodily attachment enforces. The distinction matters, and the process leading to it must be followed exactly.

Is this done before or after garnishment and levy?

Usually before, because it identifies what to garnish and levy. Where the creditor already knows the debtor's bank or employer, those tools may go first and the examination follows to find the rest.

The discipline behind the result

Post-judgment discovery is where a silent debtor becomes a documented one. We use the fact information sheet, the subpoena, and the deposition in sequence, backed by the court's contempt power, until the assets are in view and the tools to reach them are chosen. Call (813) 288-1881.